,,, /\ Lctt«2.r of Vindication 

to His txceUency^Col' Monroe, 
Tr^^li^^-vit of fcVie. O-niteA. States, 



7 




Class P?^4 
Rnnk .K Z'- 









t^U'L. 



^ A LETTER, ^c. / ' 



Sir— 

Having recently returned to this, ray native, country, 
after a long absence, I hasten thus to pay my respects 
to your excellency, in consequence of a communication 
relative to myself, which you made to your ex-consul for 
Tunis, M. M. Noah, esq. on his return from that place j 
as published in a volume by him, entitled, his " Travels in 
Europe and Africa." 

Your excellency will recollect that in 1813, you, as 
secretary of state under Mr. president Madison, gave to 
the Tunisian consul, then about to set out upon his 
mission, the following instructions. 

" On your way to Tunis, perhaps at Malaga or Marseilles, 
you may probably devise means for the liberation of our 
unfortunate countrymen at Algiers, whose situation has 
excited the warmest sympathy of their friends, and indeed 
of the people generally of this country. Should you find 
a suitable channel, through which you can negotiate their 
immediate release, you are authorised to go as far as three 
thousand dollars a man ; but a less sum rtiay probably effect 
the object. Whatever may be the result of the attempt, 
you will, for obvious reasons, not let it be understood to 
proceed from this government, but rather from the friends 
of the parties themselves. As yet, we have information 



'^'-.t, 



'-^. 






only of elevfen persons ; the crew of the brig Edwin, of 
Salem, being confined at Algiers, and it is to be hoped that 
no addition has been made to that number. If success 
should attend your efforts, you will draw upon this depart- 
ment for the necessary funds for paying their ransom, and 
providing for their comfortable return to their country and 
friends." 

In consequence of, and in conformity with, these instruc- 
tions, the consul made an arrangement with me, in Cadiz, 
to go to Algiers for the purpose of liberating the captives 
to whom you referred. And because his choice fell on me 
for accomplishing this affair, and not because the affair itself 
was illy transacted- — for, on the contrary, you yourself, 
as will be seen in the sequel, were content with the result of 
my negotiation— you heaped upon him your reproaches, 
and acrimoniously designated me as " a most obnoxious 
character." 

For this opprobrious denunciation you assigned no rea- 
son ; specified no grounds ; so that whilst you opened a door 
to let in unlimited imputation against me, you shut it 
against my defence ; unless, indeed, such defence should 
embrace every incident of my life, on which reproach could 
be supposed to attach. 

As prefatory, then, to the review, which your unfair 
mode of warfare has forced upon me, of every incident of 
my life on which reproach could be supposed to attach^ it 
will be allowed to me to state, that I was born in Maryland, 
December 25th, 1779, of a branch of the stock of him, who, 
during his embassy at the Spanish court, put a bit in the 
mouth of Noailles and a hook in the nose of Ensenada ;* 
that after having graduated at Princeton college, and been 

♦ The marquis of Ensenada, another Godoy in the period of his ministry, 
was, through the management of Sir Benjamin Keene, degraded from his 
high rank and banished for his intrigues in favour of France and against 
England, after Keene had rendered abortive three successive attempts of 
Mr. Noailles, prime minister of Louis XV to form with Spain a family 
compact ; a compact, however, that was ultimately carried into effect after 
the death of Keene, whom Noailles, styled "politique, adroit et profond." 

No reference, cei'tainly, would have been made to this subject— for no 
person can view it with more iudifference than I do-^had not an official 



enrolled among the counsellors of law of Baltimore, I 
transferred my residence from that city to New Orleans, 
carrying with me, besides many other recommendations, 
those of generals Harper and Smith ; that in New Orleans, 
governor Claibourne, a favourite chief of the then president, 
Mr. Jefferson, although fully aware, of course, that I was 
not of his political party, conferred upon me, without the 
least effort, direct or indirect, on my part ; surrounded as 
he was by his own numerous and respectable partisans, many 
of whom were unprovided for ; both a civil and a military 
employment of honour and of profit ; that I resigned those 
employments, although ever possessed of the confidence, 
esteem and friendship of that good man and virtuous 
functionary, who gave them, with the view of establishing an 
Irish Catholic colony in Spanish America ; that to facilitate 
the accomplishment of my plan of colonization I went to 
the Havana, and from thence to Spain, during the captivity 
of Ferdinand VII. recommended to the regency, by the 
captain-general of Cuba, the marquis of Someruelos ; that 
by the unanimous vote of the cortes, after a favourable con- 
sulta of the council of state, and the concurrence of the re- 
gency, was made to me a grant of the public lands, in Mex- 
ico, of greater extent than that of the two largest states of 
this Union ; that suspending the taking possession of this 
magnificent grant, I went to Algiers, to negotiate for the ran- 
som of the American citizens held in slavery by the dey, Ali 
Bassa ; that on my return from Algiers, with partial suc- 
cess, notwithstanding the haughty answer at first given m6 
by that merciless tyrant, that his policy was to increase^ 
instead of diminishing^ the number of his American slaves ; 
I found king Ferdinand re-established upon his throne, and 
obtained from him not only a confirmation of my original 
grant, but also a carte blanche for treating, in person, with 
the vice-roy of Mexico, about the best mode of carrying my 
colony into effect ; that I thereupon set out from Madrid, 
for Mexico, by way of Cadiz, with recommendations for 

personage taken pains both in and out of Uie United States to cUscredii 
me in respect of pedigree / 



the vice-roy, and other personages in Mexico, from the 
minister of the Indies, cardinal Gravina, the bishop of 
Puebla de los Angeles, and from several Spanish generals ;* 
and that on my arrival at Cadiz, finding it necessary to sus- 
pend my voyage to Mexico, on account of the calumnies of 
R. W. Meade, navy-agent of the United States for Cadiz, 
then residing in that city, and now in Philadelphia, I re- 
turned to Madrid, in order to have those calumnies taken 
cognizance of, and decided upon, by the supreme council of 
war. 

Whilst I am now about to review the calumnies of your 
navy-agent, which he has confessed to have transmitted, at 
least, in part, to the American government, I will also no- 
tice every other imputation, within my knowledge, that 
could, by any possibility, have served as the ground-work, 
on your part, of my crimination. 

The only specific allegations that I have ever heard of 
against me are reducible to the following heads : the viola- 
tion of the embargo ; treason against the United States ; 
seduction ; conspiracy against Mexico , and anti-AmericaJi 
politics. 

The imputed violation of the embargo laws was published 
throughout the United States, and was said to have taken 
place in a voyage that I made from Baltimore to New 
Orleans, in 1808, in the schooner Meteor ; such importance 
having been given to the subject, as to induce a belief 
that I had organized, and was executing, a deep-laid plan, 
for counteracting the " anti-belligerent tendencies" of the 
government's " restrictive energies." 

• From one of those letters addressed to the vlce-roy, the following is 
an extract ; 

" Convencido de que no puede \'m. dexar de acoger baxo su proteccion 
los hombres de probidad y talento, ni mirar sm el mayor interes la prospe- 
lidad de los vastos paises que el rey ha puesto a su cargo, me tomo la liber- 
tad de recomendar, 4 vm. mui particularmente, al Sr, Don iJicardo Raynal 
Keene, coronel de los reales exercitos, que, de orden del gobierno, pasa A 
presentarse y tratar con vm. acerca de cierto proyecto util al Estado y 
favorable ^ los Irlandeses Catolicos. El conocimiento que tengo de las 
virtudes que adornan a este amigo mio me asegura que correspondera 
dignamente ^las bondades que vm. le dispense." 



The facts of this case are those that follow :— When 
about to return from Baltimore to New Orleans, in the 
spring of 1808, an interesting object of a political nature, 
besides my own private concerns, made it desirable for me, 
on the way, to visit the Havana. The embargo interposed 
formidable obstacles to the accomplishment of my wishes. 
To overcome those obstacles I bought of Messrs. Olivers, 
of Baltimore, for 6000 dollars, the schooner Meteor, of 100 
tons burthen, with the intention of sailing in ballast. Sub- 
sequently, however, to my purchase of this vessel, finding 
it impracticable to negotiate for money a bond of 1500 dol- 
lars, of which I was the obligee — a bond that had been 
given me long before the embargo, and still had several 
months to run before it became due — but at the same time 
finding it easy to make an exchange or barter of it for domes- 
tic produce ; which from the suspension of foreign com- 
merce had become the veriest drug; and knowing that, 
from the usual course of the Mississippi trade, the nominal 
price of flour in Baltimore could readily be made effective in 
New Orleans, at least for a small quantity, such as only 
could constitute a cargo for the Meteor ; I therefore availed 
myself of this opportunity to realize the bond in question, 
by exchanging it for 300 barrels of flour, which were laden 
on board the forementioned vessel. The clearance bond for 
the voyage was given by me, after the lading, according 
to the requisitions of the law ; and to satisfy the scruples of 
the collector, ad interim, Mr. Brice— scruples growing 
out of the rigour of the embargo-statutes and his own ho- 
nourable and correct principles and views — as to my bona 
fide purpose of making a lawful voyage, I convinced him of 
my original intention to sail in ballast, and of the correct- 
ness of the foregoing facts relative to the date, import, and 
exchange of the forementioned bond, which alone caused 
the modification of that intention ; the archives of his de- 
partment furnishing him with abundant proof of the usual 
€3^portation of flour from Baltimore to New Orleans. Super- 
added to these considerations, internal and conclusive evi- 
dence, as to the legality of my views and proceedings, wa^ 



deducible from the fact, that the clearance-bond involved a 
penalty of double the amount of the value of the vessel and 
cargo ; so as to fix the ratio between the penalties of the 
vessel and the cargo at, 12,000 dollars for the former, and 
3,000 dollars for the latter. Now the probability of gain 
could, of necessity, according to the principles of human 
action, have constituted the only inducement to a violation 
of the embargo ; but as in the event of such violation, the 
loss or forfeiture would have been 15,000 dollars, the ag- 
gregate of the penalties for vessel and cargo, in the utter 
absence of all data from which to infer the realization of 
any profit upon the cargo in a foreign port that would not be 
inferior and greatly inferior to that loss, whilst every vessel, 
certainly, is exposed to intrinsic deterioration, and, proble- 
matically, to intrinsic deterioration, likewise, by her every 
voyage, so as to place the estimate on the side of diminution, 
rather than on that of the augmentation, of her value, by her 
change of ports ; it of course results that every calculation 
oiinterest forbade the violation of the embargo, and required 
a strict conformity with its provisions. A speculation upon 
the embargo demanded the reverse of the Meteor's case: it 
demanded an excess of value of the cargo above that of the 
vessel; and so in fact were the numerous speculations of 
that class made. If I had expended in a vessel^ only, the 
1500 dollars given for the Meteor's cargo, and in flour, the 
6,000 dollars given for the Meteor herself, I could have ex- 
ported 1200 barrels instead of 300 barrels, without any in- 
crease of the penalties expressed in the clearance-bond, so 
as thereby to have augmented the gains, in a fourfold ratio, 
without any additional cost or risk. 

As I made no insurance either upon vessel or cargo, 
safety in the voyage became, on that account, an object of 
more than ordinary importance. To arrive at my destina- 
tion four passages presented themselves : the first, along the 
northern margin of the grand bank of Bahama; the second, 
across that bank ; the third, through the old Bahama 
straits ; and the fourth, between the neighbouring capes of St. 
Domingo and Cuba, and along the southern coast of Cuba, 



doubling cape St. Anthony. In the first and second pas,-* 
sages there is always danger of being swept back, before 
reaching the meridian of Matanzas, by the gulf stream ; 
to the third, numerous perils are incident from the narrow- 
ness and length of the straits to be run through ; whilst 
the fourth is exempt from every danger of currents and of 
i-ocks. The fourth passage, therefore, although the longest, 
became, in the defect of insurance, preferable to the rest : 
and over and above its security, it afforded me the advan- 
tage of rendering practicable my landing on the south side 
of Cuba, so as to cross over to the Havana, and have, at 
least, in all probability, eight or ten days for arranging m)*- 
business there, before the vessel could beat up on the north 
side of the Island, and await my ulterior dispositions and 
orders, off the Morro, and then bear away for her final des- 
tination, without breaking the continuity of the voyage. 

With this plan formed, I set sail from Baltimore, at the 
period indicated : and after having given to the embargo- 
officers the fullest opportunity of satisfying both their curi- 
osity and their conscience about rqy voyage — for I pur- 
posely made the master lie at anchor twelve hours under 
the guns of fort M'Henry, to bid defiance to malicious con- 
jectures — I proceeded to the coast of Cuba, between Santi- 
ago and Trinidad. Here the Meteor, although in the due 
prosecution of her lawful voyage, was captured by the En- 
glish frigate, Meleager, captain Broughton, under the extra~ 
vagant and unjustifiable pretext of my having a?z intentioti to 
make a voyage against the Ameiicaii Embargo laxvs !—a.n 
intention, which, had it really existed and been reduced to 
practice, was nothing to him, whilst he should h^ve known 
that no intention solely, however illegal soever might be the 
object contemplated, could furnish just ground for capture 
— and under that pretext, as if a British frigate had been a 
revenue cutter of the United States, took possession of the 
Meteor, manned her with his own crew, carried her into 
Jamaica and libelled her in the court of vice-admiralty for 
condemnation ! After trial the vessel was restored to me : 
but upon a thre'atened appeal, on the part of the captor, to 

B 



10 

England ; during the pendency of which, as I should have 
had wrested from me both vessel and cargo, or the amount 
of their value in money, by way of security for the final 
judgment ; I was obliged to submit, as a less grievous alter- 
native, to the extortion of reimbursing the captor's costs, 
which, together with my own, exceeded 2000 dollars. 

At the period of the trial in question, there was a law in 
Jamaica that prohibited, in all cases, the exportation of pro- 
visions from the island : and under this law, after the decree 
ot restitution, a forced sale was made of the Meteor's cargo. 

Hence, then, occured a case of deviation of voyage and 
disposition of cargo from irrcsiatible force. And for this 
unavoidable deviation and disposition, the penalty of 15,000 
dollars, of the embargo bond, given by me in Baltimore, 
was, by the decree of the government judge, in New Or- 
leans, required of me, although that judge, through the ad- 
mission of the government attorney, was constrained to be- 
hold, in the record before him, the authentic facts of the cap- 
ture of the Meteor, her entry in a foreign port and the sale 
of her cargo, all through irresistlbk and unavoidable force ; 
an irresistible and unavoidable force which alone broke the 
continuity of her laxvful voyage xvhich she 7vas duly prose- 
cuting at the time of the capture I 

Upon the supposition that any statute could have been 
iniquitous and monstrous enough to call for a decree of con- 
demnation for not avoiding a thing unavoidable^ or for the 
non-performance of an impossibility^ any intelligent and con- 
scientious judge, in taking cognizance of that statute, would 
pronounce it ineffective and void, upon the paramount prin- 
ciple that human legislation is subordinate to the requisi- 
tions of morality, reason and justice. But, unfortunately, 
intelligence and conscientiousness do not always preside in 
the judgment seat : for as is seen by a recurrence to expe- 
rience a judge will, sometimes, in disregard of the hallowed 
ends of his office, and in contempt of the sacred maxims 
prescribed for his government, degenerate into a mere or- 
gan oi policy and oi party -politics. 

The miserable Meteor, conjured by politico-juridico le- 



a 

gerdemain into a portentous comet, having thus passed 
away in innoxious ether, I now solicit your excellency's at- 
tention to Meade's assertions, and their refutation. 

On my arrival in Cadiz, from Madrid, in 1815, on my 
way to Mexico, I was informed that Meade had been clan- 
destinely showing a manuscript document alleged to be 
sufficient to convict me of treason. I expressed to him my 
desire to see that document, in order to determine if it were 
genuine or spurious, and to be made acquainted with the 
matter in which the supposed treason consisted. He con- 
fessed that there was such a document as the one referred 
to, and, in substance, alleged that it proved me to be, at 
one and the same time, the author of an invective against 
the government of the United States, and the perpetrator 
of treason.* But as if fully aware of the hollow ground on 
which he stood, he perseveringly refused to admit of my 
inspection and examination of the invective-treason docu- 
ment in question — although its exhibition was required for 
the avowed purpose of deciding upon lis genuineness or spu- 
riousness and upon my express offer to give satisfactory se- 
curity for its return— and as a substitute for the original, 
offered to show what he called its copy., upon conditions., 
which, together with their inadmissibility, v/ill presently be 
explained. 

■* Meade's IcUer containing' tliis twofold accusation o^ invective and of 
treason was filed on the record of my process in the supreme council of war; 
as was also his declaration, under oath, upon tlie same subject — and the 
following extracts are taken from the recoi-d itself. 

" Havla visto" — Meade — " un papel 6 documento de la propia letrade 
V" — Keene — " en lengua Espanola, conteniendo una inveciiva \nolenta 
contra el gobierno de los Estados Unidos." 

"Las copias de el" — the manuscript attributed to Keene — "fueronman- 
dadas a el gobierno Americano, no para el designio de establecer A los 
ojos de aquel gobierno su traicion de V" — Keene — " pues con estn otras cip- 
cunstancias ya les havia hecho suficientemente instruidos, pero con el mo- 
tive de que la provision competente se hiciese para proteger a A''ueva Or- 
leans, el panto amenazado ." 

Refen-ing to this document, under oath, Meade, speaking in the third 
person of himself, adds , " Como Americano libi'e le ha graduado de trai- 
cion." A'sa frep Amerirart, he defined H treqsmi. 



As to " invective'^ or d censorious opinion given up6n Ame- 
l*ican politics, .siwh a thitig- I knew to be as true as that the 
charge of treason w^s Jalse : and for me so to express myself, 
I also knew to be conformable with law and usage in the 
United States. And if it were necessary for me to shelter 
myself under authority or precedent for so doing, would it 
not be sufficient, waving other numerous cases, to cite the 
celebrated communication to Mazzi, in which the Ameri- 
can executive, when Washington constituted it, was describ- 
ed as belonging to and forming part of " an Anglo-monar- 
chico-aristocratico faction," or to cite the proceedings of 
the Grand Society of this city, which, under the auspices of 
the sign of the cross-keys^ — as if it were intended to erect 
their chief into a political St. Peter, respectively to ^^Wand 
to loose their enemies and their friends— a-launched forth in- 
vectives the most rancorous against that same executive ? 

But although I had the right, in common with the rest 
of mankind, to express my censure of the American go- 
vernment, both in its theory and practice, yet I here must 
emphatically remark that considerations of self-defence and 
of self-defence only^ extorted from me a much more exten- 
sive exercise of that right in Spain, than, without such 
potent and indeed imperious considerations, I should have 
indulged myself in. 

Whatever might have been the causes that led to it, the 
fact unquestionably was, that the most laboured efforts 
were continually made, and that too by men of high in- 
fluence, to defeat my plan of Mexican colonization by im- 
pressing the Spanish government with the belief that I was 
a secret agent of this government for extending their re- 
publican dominion into Mexico.^ 

' I hold in my possession the orig-inal ivformes or deiuinciations of the 
Marquis of Casa-Ymjo, ex-minister in this country, the generals Abadia 
a,nd Campana, and of Sarmiento, the alcahuete-diplomatico of Casa-Yrujo, 
which they dehvered in to the Spanish government, for the avowed pur^ 
pose of defeating my Mexican colony : and these ivfovmes were kept in 
secret operation against me, for five years, under the dexterous and mali- 
cious management of the profligate Anduaga, before I had an opportanity 



13 

Finding myself, as I did, thus unjustly and prejudicially 
assailed by a host of enennies on the very commencement 
of my negotiations with the Spanish government; and really 
and in my conscience disapproving of certain things both 
in the theory and practice of the American government; 
referring particularly, in the latter sense, to the mode of 
acquiring Spa.nish territory upon the Mississippi, and, in 
the former sense, to a frank exposition which will be here- 
inafter made ; I, therefore, feeling it to be not only tny 
right but also my duty to counteract this injurious false- 
hood of my secret agency for carrying republican doctrine 
And dominion into Spanish America for the furtherance of 
the hostile policy of the United States, expressed those dis- 
approving sentiments with the highest possible colouring, 
and likewise, occasionally, diverted, from me, the attention 
of the bull of calumny, when goring me without mercy, by 
means oichuloria. But every thing that I expressed, whether 
of real or feigned disapprobation, against the government of 
the United States, was expressed ahvays openly and never se- 
tretly. And so well acquainted was Meade with the publicity 
with which I ever manifested my sentiments upon Ameri- 
can topics, and also with the object, as already mentioned, 
with which I so expressed them, that he never would have 
thought of duping this government into a belief of m)- 
" treason^'* were it not that he was also endeavouring to 
dupe it into his promotion from navy-agent to consul oi' 
Cadiz. When, then, he superadded to the true allegation 
of invective the false one of treason, I saw clearly through 
his insidious scheme. Invective alone was a harmless thing. 
The transinission to Washington of a mere matter of invec- 
tive would have given him little or no advantage in his con- 
sular pretension. But treason was a matter of importance: 
and his zeal and sagacity in bringing it to light would not 
fail, in his opinion, to augment his claim to presidential pa- 

of defending myself against the gross and injurious imputations that they 
contained; one of which was, that Thad been and still was a secret agent of 
'the government of the United States I 



14 

tronage. And although the charge of it against me was as 
false as that of invective was true^ yet the harmless truth 
was to be combined with the injurious falsehood^ to give to 
the latter a more ready currency. A traitor was to be fer- 
reted out as a fit victim to be offered up on the altar of 
sham -patriotism and of self-interest. To procure such a 
victim in me — although in a period when he was profuse 
in his professions of friendship — Meade, as I conceived, 
had formed the project of a political web, the woo/' whereof 
was of invective and the ivarp of treason. And thus woven, 
as appeared to be the case, his parti-coloured web of a ge- 
nuine -woof and a spurious warp^ he got it certified by his 
journeymen into an exquisite sample of master-workman- 
ship! The essences of things, however, are not to be 
changed by the magic of certificates. 

The common sense of mankind has ordained that a do- 
cument, stigmatized as spurious, ought to be exposed to 
full and fair scrutiny before credit be attached to it. 
Meade, however, as if looking upon scrutiny as a mine in 
whose explosion would be involved a catastrophe, perti- 
naciously refused to square his conduct by the universal 
rule of justice, and insisted upon making me out to be a 
traitor, upon the strength of a simple copy of such stigma- 
tized documejit^ in careful concealment of the original! 

Finding it necessary to give a check to Meade in his 
career of calumny, founded, as I believed, in forgery, in 
order to prevent his availing himself of my absence to 
sacrifice me to the suspicions of the Spanish government ; 
and deprecating the procrastinations that would be at- 
tendant upon a judicial check; I, therefore, although aware 
of the disqualification incident to the appalling imputa- 
tion which Meade's own conduct extorted from me, re- 
solved to bring him to a speedy settlement, through the 
medium of an interview j which was accordingly demanded 
of him. But even here I was mistaken : for he eluded my 
grasp through the back-door of stratagem! He refused to 
give me the interview demanded, unless upon conditions^ 



15 

the fulfilment of xohich he knew to he impracticable'. For 
these conditions, in eJOPect or substance, required in the 
first place, that I should admit altogether or deny altogether 
the twofold accusation of invective and of treason^ and, in 
the next place, that such categorical and collective admis- 
sion or denial should be made upon the inspection, not of 
the original invective-treason document stigmatized as spu- 
rious, but, forsooth, of what was called its copy! 

Now, 'tis repeated, as the invective-hr^nch of Meade's 
twofold accusation against me was true^ whilst the treason- 
branch thereof was false^ I was required, of course, to con- 
vert either the notorious truth of invective into a falsehood^ 
or the injurious falsehood oi treason into a truth! Either 
the genuine woof of the invective-treason-web was to be 
rendered spurious^ or the spurious warp of the same web 
was to be rendered genuine! 

Such a requisition of a metamorphosis either of truth into 
falsehood^ or o{ falsehood into truth — a requisition of a re^ 
conciliatory contradiction^ or of a contradictory reconcilia- 
tion — necessarily involved a moral impossibility; and there- 
fore rendered the condition that grew out of it imprac- 
ticable ^ 

And no less impracticable, according to the principle of 
self-defence, than the first condition, was the second that 
required me to abandon my uniform and invariable preten- 
sion to the inspection of the original document^ in question, 
and to act upon its alleged copy as a substitute for that orf- 
ginal. For when Meade saw from my correspondence that 
my settled and unalterable intention was to protect myself 
against his charge of treason by showing the spuriousness 
of the document on which he relied to prove it, and to 
bring home to him a counter-charge, his demand of me to 
act upon a copy of that document was tantamount to re- 
quiring of me a relinquishment of the means of making 
manifest my innocence. Thus absurd and preposterous 



16 

werfe the conditions that constituted Meade's sine qua nm 
of interview ! 

" Quien qujsiere decir «(?, sin hacerse odioso, diga *i, 
con alguna condicion que parezca pero no sea posible.^^^ 

Judicial recourse now became my only alternative for 
putting to 1-esi the forementioned charge of treason. This 
recourse was accordingly had to the supreme council of 
war, and terminated in my full acquittal : for this tribunal 
decided that Meade's imputations ruere incapable of injuring- 
VI I) fair reputation — " que no dcheji ofender la huena reputa- 
cion y concepto que Kcene se tenga grangeado.''^\ 

* Whoever wishes to say no without making himself odious, has only 
to say r]es, upon a condition that is specious but impracticable. 

f During- the pendency of my process before the supreme council of 
war, upon Meade's charge of treason, 1 put upon the record, in order to 
draw moi-e completely his sting, certam recriminations. But these re- 
criminations hardly seemed to merit his attention whilst they were shut 
up within the precincts of the tribunal. Subsequent!}', however, after 
1 had caused them to be pubUsheil, without troubling myself about the 
tedious prerequisites for publication, under the sanction of the judge of the 
press, iMeade, ascertaining my contemptuous omission of these des,;otic 
shackles, founded upon it a charge of libel: and for this libelhe demanded 
my imprisonment in a castle for ten years, the embargo of my property, 
and the divestitvu-e of my military commission ! But as the laws of Spain 
allow, in a case of self-defence ; unlike the crude English law, quoad hoc, 
practised in the United States ; the tr'uth of matter charged as a libel to be 
pleaded in justification, I , of course, had nothing to fear in bringing up this 
libel, from the inferior judge, whom Meade selected for the original cog- 
nizance of it — and who, as if to gratify, in part, a client, ordered me to be 
put under an arrest in my own quarters, without hearing my defence or 
admitting me to bail — to the supreme council of v/ar. For no sooner was 
this Ubel brought before them, than they, upon hearing my justificatory 
plea, dismissed it, with an order for my immediate release from arrest and 
the payment of some trifling fine for an unauthorised publication— thns 
chnching, as it would seem, the last nail in the coffin of Meade's condem- 
nation ! But notwithstanding the Spanish judgments— whose autnentic 
exemphfications I have in my possession— upon which I principally rdied 
for establishing the truth of my recriminations, Meade, as 1 have reason 
to suspect, has now the effrontery to claim, from the United States, money, 
out of the Florida fund, in the very face of those same condemnatory 
judgments ! 



17 

Thus far does the charge of indefnite treason^ that Meade 
made against me, appear manifestly to be without even the 
shadow ;)f foundation. But there has been made against 
me, throughout the United States, another charge of defi- 
nite treafion^ relative to the battle of New Orleans. For, 
in the rage for calumny, I have been assailed with the 
accusation of having not only given to the English the 
plan of that battle^ but also of having assisted them infight- 
ing it ! 

I can only oppose to this outrageous fabrication the most 
unqualified denial, accompanied with my solemn assevera- 
tion, that I never had directly or indirectly any sort of agency 
?n, or coi7nection zvith, that battle^ or any other vtatter of an 
English character^ before^ duririg, or since, the war in xohich 
that battle xvas fought— -so help me God ! 

A geiieral Keene was next in command, in the battle of 
New Orleans, after general Packenham : and it is possible 
that an involuntary error gave rise to the account of my 
co-operation with the English on that occasion, by the con- 
founding of names : as, in fact, on other occasions, par- 
ticularly in Gibraltar, I have been made a substitute for a 
lieutenant Keene, with whom I never had any other connec- 
tion than that of name, as in the case of the general, and 
of having married Eleonora, 5 ounger daughter of Luther 
Martin, Esq. of Baltimore, whilst lieutenant Keene married 
her elder sister, Maria ; Eleonora having died in New York, 
in 1807, and Maria being still alive. But as I have no 
ambition to ascend to a substitution for the general, so 
neither can I consent to descend to that for the lieutenant ; 
but content myself M'ith my own intermediate rank of cO' 
Ion el. 

The ghost of treason, so often conjured up against me, 
being thus laid, I have now to call your excellency's atten- 
tion to the charges against me of seduction and Mexican 
ronspiractj^ which, as they were together made, together I 
will refute. 

Meade, after having rnrnmenced his warfare, as already 

C 



18 

explained, followed it up with a new representation, from 
which I submit to your excellency the following authentic 
extract. 

" It is necessary to molest the attention of your majesty 
with a relation more positive [relacion mas positiva] of the 
events which were the origin and final cause of the ex- 
patriation of Raynal Keene ; events which, had they been 
known in the beginning, would have prevented all confidence 
in an association with him, and have saved the blush excited 
by the necessary manifestation of the frailties of a country- 
man. Raynal Keene dedicated himself to the study of the 
law without any other funds than the beneficence of Mr. 
Luther Martin, a lawyer of the United States, in Balti- 
more, with whom he was a student, and through gratitude 
seduced a daughter of his master [seduxo a una hija de su 
maestro] and carried her off clandestinely from her father's 
house, notwithstanding that, in that country the women are 
free to contract matrimony without their parents being able 
to resist their election. He conducted her to the state of 
New York, and Mr. Martin having published the forcible 
carrying off of his daughter [rapto] by Keene, the latter 
answered him in a publication so immoral, that the in- 
habitants of Baltimore, filled with horror [horrorizados] at 
the former act and this production, obliged Keene, although 
married to Miss Martin, to leave that country, from whence 
he went to establish himself in New Orleans, the capital of 
Louisiana, which, ceded by Spain to France, was purchased 
by the United States. About that time Aaron Burr, a 
lawyer of said states, who had been vice-president of them 
and as such president of the senate, wished to be elected 
president. But not being successful he discovered that he 
had lost his influence. Finding that he could not obtain 
the supreme command in the United States he retired to 
Louisiana and formed the project of erecting an independent 
government, by possessing himself of the Spanish province 
of Texas, and drawing under his power part of the territory 
of Mexico, since he was not able to obtain the supreme 



19 

command in the United States. To realize this project 
there became associated with him various partisans, and 
among them was accounted Richard Raynal Keene. The 
government of the United States penetrated this project, 
and, it is certain, gave orders to brigadier Wilkinson, gene- 
ral of the troops of Louisiana, that with his forces he should 
prevent the execution of it, as well against the Spanish go- 
vernment as against the United States, and to arrest those 
who were comprehended in it. In consequence of this, 
Wilkinson arrested the principal conspirators, among thenti 
Aaron Burr and Raynal Keene, and carried them to Vir- 
ginia, where they were adjudged as traitors [juzgados como 
traidores,] but as the crime was not proven in such a man- 
ner as the laws of the country required, they were absolved, 
although hated by all the Americans who were satisfied of 
their crime in consequence of the grave indications that 
resulted [graves indicios que resultaron ;] so that the presi- 
dent of the United States, in his message to congress, en- 
treated that they would examine the law in this particular, 
and make the suitable explanations, [las oportunas aclara- 
ciones,] in order that impunity should not attach to the 
guilty, like those who were just adjudged." 

Presently shall your excellency see the value that is to be 
set upon Meade's assertions — assertions no less repugnant 
to delicacy and humanity than they are at variance with 
truth — in testing them by a matter-of-fact standard. And 
here let me ask : if it shall appear by irrefragable proof that 
Meade has wantonly and deliberately sacrificed truth in this 
instance, in which he has spoken out, what weight shall be 
given to his allegations made in secrecy and in darkness ? 

Luther Martin, esq. is cited by Meade as a witness to 
testify to the degradation of his own daughter by me; a 
degradation involved in her alleged ''^ seduction^'' not to saj' 
*' rapid*'' also ! I now present to your view the deposition 
of that gentleman, sent to me in Spain, in 1816, upon the 
subject of this " seduction" and " rapto!^'' and likewise upon 



20 



the subject ot my alleged arrest^ trials co-adjudication^ and 
contemporaneous flighty xvitli Mr. Burr, for 3Iexican conspi' 
racy ! 

" State of Maryland, City of Annapolis, to wit : 
" I, Luther Martin, esq. chief justice of the court of 
Oyer and Terminer, and Goal Delivery for Baltimore 
county, in the state aforesaid, having received information 
that some base and malicious calumniator hath falsely and 
maliciously charged Richard Raynal Keene, formerly a 
citizen of this state, and who for a considerable time past 
hath resided in the kingdom of Spain, with having been 
concerned with colonel Aaron Burr, formerly vice-president 
of the United States, in a conspiracy against Mexico, or some 
part of the Spanish colonies ; and hath also represented that 
the said. Keene had been carried prisoner with the said Burr 
from Louisiana, to the state of Virginia, on account of said 
conspiracy, and partly for treason against the United States 
of America ; and furthermore, to injure the said Keene, 
and to give a colour to, and render more probable, those 
vile chai'ges, hath falsely and maliciously represented and 
alleged that the said Keene had been guilty of seducing 
my daughter, Eleonora, to whom, while he resided in Ame- 
rica, before his visit to Spain, he had been married : in or- 
der to vindicate the character of the said Richard Raynal 
Keene, and to free him from the aforesaid vile and infamous 
charges and accusations against him, and to prove their 
falsehood and malice, I feel myself under the most solemn 
obligation to declare all my knowledge of the aforesaid facts 
on those subjects ; and I do hereby most solemnly swear^ 
depose, and declare, (appealing to the omniscient God for 
the truth of the facts herein deposed, sworn to, and declar- 
ed,) that I was one of the counsel who attended for the said 
Aaron Burr, and advocated his cause, at Richmond, in the 
state of Virginia, and defended him against the prosecutions 
instituted against him in that place ; that I regularly attended 
as one of his counsel during the time the grand jury were 



21 

making inquiry against him, from an early state of the in- 
vestigation until he was ultimately acquitted and discharged^ 
(a period of, I believe, five months or more,) and that du- 
ring the whole investigation, no charge was made, or at- 
tempted to be made, against Richard Raynal Keene, as be- 
ing in any manner concerned or connected with the said 
Burr, in any conspiracy, or in any of his designs, of whatso- 
ever nature they might be ; and that there was no evidence 
given in the trial and investigation of that cause, which in 
any manner implicated the said Richard Raynal Keene, as 
being engaged in, or contemplating any thing injurious to 
the Spanish colonies or to the United States, either in union 
with the said Burr, or in any other way or manner. And 
I further do swear, depose, and declare, that I never heard, 
nor do believe, that the said Richard Raynal Keene was 
confined as a prisoner any where, or for any charge ; that I 
know he was not brought with the said Burr as a prisoner, 
or in any other manner, from Louisiana to the state of Vir- 
ginia ; and that, on the contrary, the said Keene, about the 
time that the said Burr was acquitted, was at full liberty and 
undisturbed, occasionally visiting New York, Philadelphia, 
and Baltimore, in pursuit of his business or his pleasure, and 
was after the said trial frequently with me at my house in 
Baltimore. And with regard to my daughter, Eleonora, I 
do further depose, swear, and declare, that the only charge 
I ever made against the said Keene, was, that availing 
himself of the opportunities which he had of being in her 
society, he, without consulting me, and in opposition to my 
views and wishes, obtained her affections, and prevailed 
upon her to marry him ; that they were duly and legally 
married in New York, to which place she had gone, on a 
visit to a branch of my family ; that I never charged 
them with or believed or suspected them to have had any 
intercourse before marriage, that was inconsistent with 
the strictest purity and chastity ; and that the insinu- 
ation or charge to the contrary is false and malicious, 
unmerited and unjust towards the said Keene, and to the 
memory of my deceased daughter. The foregoing facts, 



22 

1, in the presence of Almighty God, depose, swear, and 
declare to be true. 

"Luther Martin." 

" State of Maryland, City of Annapolis, to wit : 
" Be it known that before me, Jeremiah Townley Chase, 
chief judge of the third judicial district of the state of Ma- 
ryland, came the above named Luther Martin, and being 
duly sworn on the holy Evangelists of Almighty God, made 
oath and deposed the sixth day of June, in the year of our 
Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixteen, that the facts 
and allegations in this his affidavit above signed with his 
name, are true as there stated. 

" Sworn before — Jeremiah Townley Chase." 

Although the deposition of Mr. Martin furnishes full and 
conclusive proof of the falsehood and malice of Meade's 
charges against me of seduction and Mexican conspiracy ^ 
yet it will be allowed me to add thereto the following de- 
position of Mr. Harper, upon the same subject. 

" United States of America, State of Maryland, to wit : 
" I, William Sterrett, notary public, by letters patent 
under the great seal of the state of Maryland, duly com- 
missioned and qualified, residing in the city of Baltimore, 
in the state aforesaid, do hereby certify, attest, and make 
known, that on the day of the date hereof, before me per- 
sonally appeared Robert Goodloe Harper, of the city of 
Baltimore aforesaid, formerly a representative, and now a 
senator in the congress of the United States, and a major 
general of the militia of the said state of Maryland, to me 
well known, and being duly sworn on the holy Evangelists of 
Almighty God, deposed and said, that he was well acquaint- 
ed with Richard Raynal Keene, formerly of the said city of 
Baltimore, who afterwards resided in New Orleans, and has 
for some time past resided in the kingdom of Spain. That 
he, the deponent, was also well acquainted with Eleonora 
Martin, afterwards Eleonora Keene, the wife of the said 



as 

Richard Raynal Keene, whom this deponent knew from her 
childhood till her death. That the said Eleonora was a 
highly virtuous, correct, and respectable woman, and was 
never in the slightest degree suspected of having been se- 
duced by the said Richard Raynal Keene before her mar- 
riage with him, or of any other improper or unbecoming 
conduct, but always sustained a very high character until 
her death. That this deponent was intimately acquainted 
with the circumstances of the said Eleonora's marriage with 
the said Keene ; and, as he believes, with all the circum- 
stances ; and was so well satisfied with her conduct in all 
that related to the said marriage, and in every other respect, 
and also with the conduct of the said Keene, for whom he 
had a great regard, that he, this deponent, and his wife, in- 
vited her and her husband to reside some weeks in his house 
as the friend and companion of this deponent's wife ; which 
they accordingly did. From all which circumstances this 
deponent is fully convinced, and doth verily believe, that 
the accusation against the said Keene, of having seduced 
his wife before marriage, is altogether unfounded. And 
this deponent further saith, that he was weil acquainted with 
the said Richard Raynal Keene at the time of the prepara- 
tions of Aaron Burr ; which were supposed and alleged to 
have been directed against the kingdom of Mexico, or New 
Spain ; and with the arrest, imprisonment, and trial of the 
said Burr, on account of the said preparations and enter- 
prise ; to all which events this deponent was led to pay very 
particular attention, by his situation and previous acquaint- 
ance with the said Burr, whom he had well known while a 
senator and vice-president of the United States. That he 
never heard it alleged, or even reported in this country, that 
the said Keene had any connexion or concern whatever in 
the said preparations or enterprise with the said Burr, or 
any other person, or was in any way privy to the scheme, 
And this opponent positively knows, and accordingly de- 
poses, that the said Keene never was judicially accused in 
the United States, or by the government, or officers thereof, 
or any other person, of any concern with the said Burr, or 



24 

of any other offence whatever. And this deponent has an 
additional and very strong reason for believing, as he does 
most confidently believe, that the said Keene had not any 
concern or connexion with the said Burr, in his afore men- 
tioned enterprise, which is this. One of the said Burr's 
principal and confidential associates was arrested at New 
Orleans, on account of his connexion in the said enterprise, 
and was brought in confinement to the city of Washington, 
where this deponent theft was. This agent having been for- 
merly acquainted with this deponent, applied to him for his 
protection and assistance in getting released, and made very 
full communications to this deponent, respecting the nature 
of the enterprise and the persons engaged in it, but he did 
not mention the name of the said Keene, or in any manner 
allude to him as one of the persons connected with the said 
Burr, in his said enterprise, or in any other way. And this 
deponent verily believes, that the suspicion of the said 
Keene's having been connected with the said Burr, arose 
from this circumstance, that after the said enterprise was 
wholly broken up, and the said Burr had obtained his dis- 
charge from prison, he was in Baltimore, in great distress, 
at which time the said Keene rendered him some services 
and assistance, which were well known to this deponent at 
the time, and which, as he verily believes, proceeded from 
pure humanity and benevolence. And further this deponent 
saith not. 

" In testimony whereof the said deponent hath hereunto 
subscribed his name, and I, the said notary have hereunto 
set my hand, and affixed my notarial seal the 8th day of June, 
in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and 
sixteen. 

" Robert G. Harper, 

" William Sterrett, Not. FubJ^ 

You, Sir, are a husband, and long may you continue in 
the enjoyment of your conjugal felicity. But should the 
time come, when, after the death of your consort, you shall, 
in pious compliance with the dictates of nature and of re- 



25 

ligion, have inscribed the appropriate epitaph upon the tomb 
of departed virtue and merit, what would be your feelings 
on beholding that epitaph erased by the ruffian hand of 
calumny, and sacrilegiously replaced with — seduction! 

Having now arrived at the charge of my anti-Americmi 
politics^ made by Meade and the pack of his kennel — com*- 
posed principally of fugitive bankrupts, seeking to be con- 
verted into navy-agents and consuls, without acknowledging 
any other rule, by which to graduate a man's merit, than his 
follow-suit-doctnnes^ the tonnage of his ship^ or the value of 
his cargo — I must beg your excellency's indulgence, whilst, 
in addition to that which I have already said in reference 
to political " invective," I make an explicit statement upon 
this subject, extracted from a memoir which I had occasion 
to present to Ferdinand VII. reigning in the plenitude of 
his despotism ; particularly with regard to American poli- 
tics ; when, of course, for having thus uttered my opinions 
\\\xhmih.tY\m\t?,oi unqualified despotism^ I ought to have cre- 
dit for sincerity for whatever was so uttered on the side or in 
favour of liberty. 1 now submit to your excellenc}^ the ex- 
tracted statement, to which I have referred. 

" With regard. Sire, to the political system of the United 
States, I cannot but disapprove of some of its principles or 
provisions — approving, as I do, the mass of them — consist- 
ing in the paradoxical organization of conflicting sovereign^' 
tics^ the greater and the lesser, as recognised in the states 
collectively and individually, and the xveakness of the execu- 
tive. 

" History, 'tis said, is philosophy teaching by example. 
And through the medium of history it is seen, that among 
the republican states of Greece, formed into a national con- 
federacy under the Amphyctionic council; though at the 
same time retaining partially their individual or state sove- 
reignty ; the sovereignty of a tnember often overruled the 
sovereignty of the confederacij .^ 

" This confederacy was successively tyrannized over, for upwards of a 

D 



26 

" In the conflicts originating in the rivalships of these 
sovereignties, a foreign prince, the inveterate enemy of 
Grecian liberty, found ample facilities, first for introducing 
himself into the national congress and then for ruling it.* 

*' The Achsean confederacy, another society of Grecian 
republics possessed of sovereignty both individual and gene- 
ra/, fell a prey to the dissentions engendered by these very 
sovereignties.! 

" The German confederacy, besides many other dissen- 
tions arising from their conflicting sovereignties, suffered 
the ravages of a war of thirty years, carried on, in part 
by the influence and resources of a foreign potentate. And 
among the offspring of that rickety giant are to be counted 
the factions of Guelf and Gibeline, the Evangelical and 
Catholic leagues, and the confederations of Leipsick and of 
the Rhine. 

"The weak and disjointed confederations of local sove- 



century, altogether, by Athens first, then by Sparta, and afterwards by 
Thebes. 

* Philip of Macedon fostered these rivalships; united with the Thebans 
and their partizans, against the Athenians and Spartans, for supporting the 
Phocians in their violation of a constitutional decree of tlie federative 
body ; bought over the popular leaders to his ambitious views ; by their 
means obtained a seat among the Ampbyctions and the appointment of 
generalissimo of their armies — and then njade himself master of the con- 
federacy. 

\ After the first dissolution of the confederacy, caused by seduction and 
provocation, into separate interests, they re -united and ralhed against the 
S[ artan invasion : but calling in foreign aid— the arms of Macedon — the 
defeat of their invaders left them at the mercy and under the domination 
of their allies. They then invoked the succour of the Romans against the 
Macedonians. The Romans assisted them with efficacy ; but, in their turn, 
by the co-operation of the Achaean demagogues, whom tliey bought over, 
they prevailed upon the Acliseans to re-establish iheiv individual sovereign, 
ties ; as better suited to the dignity of a free people ; and then availing them- 
selves of the feuds and animosities excited between the conflicting sove- 
reignties- general and particular or national and local — they caused the 
confederacy to be broken up into fragments ! 



27 

clgyities in Holland and Switzerland, through their refrac. 
tory and discordant spirit, facilitated their subjection to the 
control of revolutionary France. 

" The first plan of confederation of the United States was 
abandoned, if not entirely yet mainly, on account of ihtpre. 
ponderating influence of the lesser or local sovereigtity over 
the greater or natiotial sovereignty — for the lesser sovereignty 
not unfrequently disobeyed triumphantly the greater save. 
reignty — whilst the second federative system is in the full 
process of instructive example. Already have the local sov- 
ereignties of Rhode-Island and Massachusetts hurled defi- 
ance in the teeth of the national sovereignty^ respecting the 
embargo and militia laws : for Rhode-Island refused to exe- 
cute the former, and Massachusetts refused to turn out her 
quota of militia force conformably to the latter, in the late 
war with England. And had the enemy, in that war, carri- 
ed on their hostilities less in the way of wanton and useless 
devastation — for the burning of the capital was one of many 
examples of such devastation— or had, indeed, those hostili- 
ties been carried on longer, the fact of the calling of a revo- 
lutionary congress at Hartford, by local sovereignty^ to coun- 
teract national sovereignty y justifies the belief that federative 
America would, have become the theatre of a new Pelopon- 
nesian war. 

" The American confederation — the old and the new — ■ 
having thus added their own proofs to those of the confede- 
rations of conflicting sovereignties that have gone before 
them, of the disastrous tendencies of such conflicting sove- 
reignties^ it remains now to exemplify the weakness of the 
executive. 

*' The union of wisdom, fidelity, and energy, is indispen- 
sably requisite for forming and giving effect to a good and 
efficient government; wisdom for ascertaining, fidelity for 
preferring, and energy for executing, the means most con- 
ducive to the common welfare 5 which constitutes the legiti- 
mate end and object of government. 

*' In the division or distribution of the attributes of go- 
vernment among the three great departments — legislative, 



28 

judicial and executive— the executive, although requiring 
Vo be endowed with wisdom and fidelity, is, nevertheless, 
ex vi termini, and from the nature of executive functions, 
that department which emphatically and pre-eminently 
claims the investment of energy. 

*' To insure the exercise of competent ienergy the con- 
currence of political and moral power is necessary. But 
how can this concurrence take place in favour or in the 
person of the executive chief of the United States, when he 
is not only liable to be set at defiance and paralysed by the 
executive chiefs of the local executive authorities-^^as ex- 
emplified in the cases of Rhode-Island and Massachusetts, 
whose respective executives signalized themselves in sus- 
taininpf a successful opposition to the national authority in 
the matter of the embargo and militia laws as already 
tited — but is also unduly controlled by the influence of the 
party that brings him into office ; and consequently deprived 
of his moral power and independence ?"* 

" The chief magistrate of a nation, whatever be his de- 
signation, ought to be the rallying point of the nation and 
hot of a party ; the exact administrator of the laws and the 
impartial dispenser, according to talent and virtue, of offi- 
tial patronage. But from the principles of human nature 
an elective chief magistrate-^— although by supposition the 
best of the human race — is insensibly and unavoidably in- 
clined in favour of the supporting party and against the op- 
posing party of his election. He, of course, besides his own 
personal feelings of favour and antipathy, becomes the organ 

• Mr. Jefferson, in his inaugural speech, amalgamated the two political 
parties which composed the nation— calling them "all federalists, all re- 
publicans." He doubtless spoke as he wished -and I am perfectly satis- 
fied that he would have acted accordingly had he been morally master of 
himself. But morally he was the chief not of the nation or of those whom he 
had just before called " all federalists, all republicans." but of that section 
only which voted him into office ; for as among the incumbents whom he 
found in office " few died and none resigned" he felt himself constrained 
— as is exemplified in the cases of the collectors of Trenton and New-Ha- 
ven — to dismiss them from their employments, although good men and 
Igood officers, merely, '• to throw open the doox-s of honour and confidence'* 
¥6r the admission of A/« o-uim partisans. 



29 

through which are made effective the feelings of a similar 
nature of his party. And under the influence of these feel- 
ings, the arbitrary, not to say the vindictive, will of a tri- 
umphant majority is liable to become a substitute for the 
law towards a defeated minority ; in like manner as official 
patronage, the common stock of the nation, is apt to be con- 
ferred even upon undeserving partisans in preference to 
meritorious opponents. 

" Hereditary power, it is alleged, is liable to degenerate 
into despotism. Elective power, in the republics of Rome 
and France, has often served to convert obsequious dema- 
gogues into sanguinary tyrants ; such as Marius and Sylla, 
Marat and Robespierre. The truth is that neither inherit- 
ance nor election, as to executive power, affords an abso- 
lute guarantee for the inviolability cf the people's rights. 
Inheritance, however, shuts out those party-attachments and 
party-prejudices that come into operation, through the me- 
dium of election, to bias and pervert the executive mind 
and to destroy executive independence. 

" The most efficacious security against executive ambi- 
tion consists, neither in the mode of executive creation nor 
in the term of executive duration, but, in the checks upon 
that ambition ; checks composed of an elective legislature, 
an independent judiciary, the trial by jury, the habeas cor- 
pus, ministerial responsibility, the prohibition cf a standing- 
army in time of peace of a greater force than might be re~ 
quisite for garrison duty and a stock on which to engraft 
militia and raw recruits in time of war, and, perhaps, above 
all, the liberty of the press. If these united checks be not 
sufficient to form a safeguard against the ambition of an in- 
dividual, in what shall security consist against the factious 
influence of the multitude, dependent upon and stimulated 
by interested and revengeful demagogues ? 

" In politics, as in physics, there exists as well the whirl- 
pool as the rock, or popular licentiousness as well as indi- 
vidual ambition. And every Palinurus knows that the 
j-iving asperity of the rock exceeds not in danger the de- 
vouring suction of the whirlpool. Not a mariner, then. 



but only a land-lubber, in navigating the Sicilian straits, 
would — instead of a middle course — run the ship into the 
vortex of Charybdis under the pretext of avoiding the rug- 
gedness of Scylla. 

" To factious and party-policy, emanating from the de- 
iFective organization, at least, in part, of the government of 
the United States, are to be attributed— besides the revo- 
lutionary congress of Hartford and the non-execution of 
the embargo and militia laws in Rhode Island and Massa- 
chusetts— .two insurrections, the ill-timed appointment of 
sixteen national judges and their unconstitutional dismis- 
sion from office, the alternate guardianship and invasion 
of the colonial interests of Spain according to the friend- 
ship or enmity of her trans-Pyrenean neighbours,* the hu- 
miliating submission to the outrages of consular and impe- 
rial France, the disreputable postponement of the late war 
with England after the inutility of negotiation was seen,| 
and the equally disreputable precipitation in concluding it, 
without either having madc'^a conquest of Canada or ob- 

* As an example of the former, judge Workman and otlier gentlemen 
were prosecuted in New Orleans for mere conversations in favour of the 
liberation of Mexico, whilst the mode of getting possession of the district of 
Baton-Rouge is a confirmation of the latter. And to such an extravagant 
lengtli was the fender mercy, the lamb-tike policy, of republican America 
shown towards the colonial despotism of Spain, that Dr. Rogers was sum- 
moned to give his declaration against me, for having jocularly remarked 
to him that his big whiskers would give him an imposing character in a Mexi- 
can expedition ! The lamb of policy, however, of New Orleans, soon af. 
terwards, became, in Baton-Uouge, if not a leolf, at least, tough mutton.' 

f In the winter of 1807-8 the American government avowed that on 
account of the aggressions of the two great belligerents — England and 
France — it remained only for them to adopt one of three expedients, to 
wit : embargo, war, or ignominious submissio7i. The first was tried for a 
while and then abandoned, witliout success, so as to become as if it never 
had been resorted to; and war was deferred, until 1812, with England, 
and as to France, sine die. Hence, then, according to the government'.-; 
own confession, the third alternative, — "ignominious submissio7i" — was em- 
braced for the long interval between the repeal of the embargo and the 
declaration of that war, as to one of the belligerents, and for a still longer 
period, in respect of the other belligerent, to the downfall of the decrees 
of Berlin, Milan, and Rambouillet, in that of their autlior. 



31 

talned any one of the objects for which that war was de- 
clared.* 

" God in the plenitude of his mercy and beneficence has 
deigned to reveal to man a rule of orthodox faith in reli- 
gion ; leaving him free, in respect of politics, to range at 
large in the boundless region of speculation. In the United 
States, however, under the influence of conflicting sove- 
reignties and a partisan executive^ the want of theocratic 
infallibility, in politics, is supplied by the unerring inspira^ 
tion of party 'Spirit. For this party-spirit, embodying itself 
into an inquisition, stamps its dogmas with evangelical 
authority, prescribes a standard of political belief, and 
takes cognizance of non-conformity with those dogmas and 
this standard as a damnable heresy. The infidel is excom- 
municated, and, dressed in a sanbenito of tar-and-feathers^ 
is, according to the shades of his unbelief, subjected, with 
all the frenzy of fanaticism, to mutilation or death — as 
testified in the cases of the generals Lee and Lingan— 
whilst in this political auto-^^.^-Je^ hallelujahs, in symphony 
with the death-groans of the victim, are chaunted by the 
faithful, in celebration of the tolerance of the prophet, who 
canonised the indifference of belief in " twenty Gods or no 
God" — as if belief in " no God," by stripping human laws 
of their potent sanction of an accovmtable hereafter, might 
not only facilitate leg-breaking and pocket-pickings but also 
the commission of every other wrong! 

" Party-spirit, like the consuming element, should nei- 
ther be suffocated nor left to unlimited control. Each is, 
in subjection, useful, and in ascendancy, destructive. Apa- 
thy and indifference on the part of the people would lead 
to misconduct on the part of their rulers. But without any 
additional incentives, party-spirit — sufficient for all salutary 

* The just and legitimate objects, for which the war referred to was 
declared by the United States, were the inviolability of the protection to tea^ 
men under the American /m^, the presence of an effective and competent force 
t» constitute blockade, and security against Canadian intervention in support 
of Indian depredations. But not one of these objects was duly provided 
for in the treaty of Ghent i ' 



32 

pusposes— might be called forth by legislative election, to- 
gether with scrupulous animadversion, through the medium 
of a free and unshackled press, upon the abuse of official 
power. 

" Americans, with their valour, enterprise and know- 
ledge, could they have employed their resources under a 
government at once energetic and free-^^ government ex- 
empt from the alternate palsy and spasms of local sove^ 
reigntif and partisan- executiveism — would, in the late war 
with P^ngland, not only have obtained the just and law-ful 
objects for which that war was declared, but also have aug- 
mented and enriched their constellation with the acquisition 
of the North-star, 

" The skill and prowess of the Americans, in the war re- 
ferred to, notwithstanding the defects of their government, 
were powerfully displayed in the plains of Platt^burg, Erie, 
and New Orleans, as well as upon the ocean — in like man- 
ner as similar qualities were displayed by their fathers un- 
der the still more defective Articles of Confederation-^ 
having, among the signs of the political zodiac, r^-placed 
the arrow-bearing America in the attitude of defiance to- 
wards the British Lion, and established her in that of tri- 
umph towards the African Scorpion." 

Such, sir, were my American politics^ as expressed to an 
absolute monarch, in his capital: and such I now fe-express 
to a republican chief magistrate within the sphere of his 
administration; being ever ready, as I am, to modify my 
opinion upon any subject, whenever I shall find it to be, 
not unpopular, but erroneous. I am sincerely attached to 
the cause of liberty — that liberty which is equidistant from 
despotism and licentiousness — and therefore can never con- 
sent to be placed in the files of her foes. For against those 
foes I have always — whenever a crisis has come within mv 
reach— taken my stand upon the same ground, %vhere, simi- 
larly situated, your excellency would have chosen your 
own post.* 

* " I, the undersigned, field-inai'shal, aid-de-camp to the king, and che- 
valiev-grand-cross of the order of San Fernando, certify, tl^at Richarf^ 



83 

My exposition on American politics was made to the 
Spanish monarch in 1816 : and, in the book referred to in 
the beginning of this letter, is to be seen an opinion of Mr, 
Jefferson, given in 1818-^as if by way of codicil to his po- 

Baynal Keene, colonel of the national armies, besides other considerable 
service, confirmed by authentic documents under my inspection, distin- 
guished himself in sustaining the cause of liberty, in the beginning of 1820, 
in consequence whereof he was immured in a dungeon and despoiled of 
his property to the amount of 19,500 dollars without ever yet having it 
refunded to him by the government ; and that for his conduct in defence 
of the same cause, in the rebellion of the royal guards, in 1822, he was 
declared a bejiemerito de la fiatria. And that the same may be made mani- 
fest as shall be fit, I give this certificate in Cadiz, August 23, 1823. 

"Antonio Quiroga," 

" I, the undersigned, count Palma, late member of the military commit- 
tee of the Isla Gaditana, &.c. &c. &c. certify, that, on the 23d Sept, last, 
during the bombardment of Cadiz, Colonel Keene co-operated, asavolun. 
teer, in its defence, in the post nearest to the enemy and n\ost exposed to 
iheir fire. 

** London, December 17, 1823, Palma." 

To prevent misunderstanding, I hereto subjoin a brief account of my 
late visit to, and departure fi'om, Spain. 

Having met with, in Bordeaux, the amnesty of the king of Spain, of 
May last and seen that all my constitutional sins, committed in that coun- 
try, were brought within its merciful purview, I went to Madrid, to en- 
deavour to obtain a royal order for the reimbursment, through the me- 
tlium of crown-lands, in Cuba, of the amount of the spoliation menlioned 
'n Quiroga's certificate ; having, unfortunately, limited myself, under the 
constitutional government, to a demand of that reimbursement in money. 
The captain-general, Carvajal, an honourable and good man, gave me his 
promise of a carta de seguridad — a document indispensably necessary for 
protecting me from arrest by the police — but, for causes beyond his con- 
trol, he could not comply with it. Instead of the letter of security a royal 
order was issued for my imprisonment ; and imprisonment then was equit 
valent to death. But real friendship, disguised as apparent enmity, ena- 
bled me to become acquainted with the precipice on which I stood. 
I eluded the pei-fidious order of imprisonment, first by close concealment, 
and then by marching out of Madrid with the 15th regiment of French 
infantry, destined to reinforce the garrison of Cadiz. On entering Cadiz 
a-head of the regiment — for I deemed it expedient to leave it at the foot 
of the Sien*a Morena — I was opportunely advised that a requisitoria had 
already come from Madrid for carrying me back there : but thus advised, 
I was enabled to elude it also, by immediately taking refuge on board the 
ship, Orleans, Captain Hardle, of this port, then about to set sail on her 
return-voyage. • 

E 



34 

iitlcal testament already before put on record — -on the prac- 
tical effects of the government of the United States, in the 
following words : " For although weare free by the law, 
zue are 7iot so in practice. Public opinion erects itself into 
an inquisition, and exercises its office with as much fanati- 
cism as fans the flame of an auto-de-fe." 

This illustrious patriot and philanthropist, in the noon of 
his career, whilst dazzled with the brilliant imagery of a 
vivid fancy, was the theoretic eulogist of unqualified demo- 
cracy. But in the evening of his life, with his mind, if less 
ardent and splendid, more tranquil and expanded, than in 
his meridian course, he becomes, substantially, the censor 
of his former doctrine ; and thereby, as it would seem, ra- 
ther supports than opposes my own way of thinking ; not 
that it should be inferred that he, any more than myself, is 
an enemy of democracy, but a friend of its mere limitation 
within the salutary bounds designated hy the facts xvhick 
experience has developed to the view. I certainly contend 
for nothing more : for rvithout democracy there can be no 
good government. But democracy, like every other good, is 
liable to become an evil through excess : and to this excess 
Qnhf do I object. 

I will now. Sir, detain you but a little while longer, to 
recapitulate, summarily, the affair of Algiers. 

In the autumn of lj813, your consul for Tunis arranged 
with me, in Cadiz, for going to Algiers to treat for the ran- 
som of the American captives held by the dey. He com- 
menced his conversation with me, and likewise ended it, 
with an assurance, that the ransom in question, was, exclu- 
sively, an affair of an association or company of private citi- 
zens of the United States, who had raised a fund for the 
purpose, by voluntary contribution. Both for my own safety, 
and the success of the negotiation, I deemed it expedient to 
carry with me to Algiers the recommendations, to their re- 
spective consuls or ministers in that place, of the British 
ambassador. Sir Henry Wellesley, and of the Spanish re- 
gency. And, under the full persuasion that I then was act- 
ing solely and exclusively, for and in behalf of the fore- 
mentioned association or company— which at best was ra- 



35 

ther a ticklish business, particularly as I was an American 
myself, with such a monster as then presided in the Algerine 
divan — I sent to Sir Henry, after a favourable understand- 
ing with the regency, the following note. 

" In the name of a private association of American citi- 
zens, I have undertaken to negotiate for the ransom of their 
captive countrymen in Algiers ; the government of the cap- 
tives having abstained from any interference in their behalf, 
from finding, as it would seem, the terror of Algerine sla- 
very conducive to the enforcement of their anti-commercial 
policy. 

*' The Spanish regency, yielding to the suggestions of 
humanity and magnanimity, have agreed to become the ad- 
vocates of those captives, by authorising me to conduct the 
negotiation, if a preferable alternative, in the name of H. C. 
M. instead of that of the American association. 

" Humanity, indeed, gives those victims of barbarian 
rapacity and perfidy — for they were captured before a 
declaration of war — an universal claim for succour. And, 
without cant, it may be said, that Christianity unites with 
humanity, in their favour, because the rigours of their 
treacherous captivity are augmented and embittered on 
account of their being believers in Christ instead of 
Mahomet. 

"The actual state of war between the respective coun- 
tries of your excellency and the captives, although consti- 
tuting you, in name, enemies, cannot, I am sure, cause you 
to pause for the enquiry — who is the subject ? when the cup 
of the bitterest dregs of misery, of which unfortunate man 
can be doomed to drink, might, by your helping hand, be 
dashed from that subject's lips. 

" Flattering myself, then, that in a case like the present- 
where no law forbids, whilst the best feelings of our nature 
recommend, an interference— you cannot be averse from 
affording all proper facility towards the successful issue of 
the negotiation in question ; I therefore beg the favour of 
your recommendation of it to the friendly offices of the 
British consul in Algiers." 



35 

• My request was acceded to : but, although, after the terrris 
bf our agreement had been settled, in conversation, be- 
tween the consul and myself, he informed me, confidentially, 
of his secret instructions, given him by your excellency; 
yet as humanity was the leadirig dbject, which, under my 
original persuasion about the American association, had 
brought the regency and ambassador into the support of my 
enterprise, I gave tieither of them any ititimation of the 
connection of the American government, with that enter- 
prise, until after I returned from Algiers. That connectiofi 
rendered my situation infinitely more perilous than it would 
have been in the .service of a private association ; inasmuch 
as its coming to the knowledge of the dey would have ren- 
dered my sacrifice to his vengeance unavoidable. And 
notwithstanding my unlimited confidence in the Spanish 
and English consuls, yet, for fear of the effects of casualty, 
I left Algiers without giving them the remotest ideia of any 
the least interest, on the paf t of this government, in the bu- 
siness that carried rrie there. 

My success as to ransom %vas but partial : and much was 
it to obtain partial success, after the dey*s two declarations, 
that^e tvoiddhot iake^Jirst^ a million of dollars^ andthen^ two 
millions of dollars, for his American slaves^ and that his pO' 
licif was to increase not to diminish their number. But 
that which was of infinitely more importance than ransom, 
J did completely succeed in obtaining : and that was, a deve- 
lopment of the views of the dey^ in respect of this country^ 
his resources for realizing those views^ and the true and pro- 
per mode at once the most honourable and economical for frus- 
trating themy and reducing him and his pirate hordes to 
unquaUfed submission. And although this development 
reached your excellency, through your consul, to whom I 
made it, in my communication from Algeziras, of the 22nd 
of May 1814, immediately On my arrival there, from Al- 
giers, nevertheless you will permit me to take a partial re- 
view of it, in the following extracts from that communicatiohk 

" Immediately upon our interview" — between the Spanish 
'consul and myself, on my arrival in Algiers—" he informed 



87 

lile that the dey had already demanded of him the precise 
and specific objects of my visit to Algiers : and from the 
unexampled rigour, violence, and despotism of that chief, 
the consul assured me that there must be no hesitation irl 
complying with his order. We accordingly agreed upon 
informing him that the American merchants in Cadiz, de- 
sirous of having their captive countrymen, in his possession, 
rescued from slavery ; atid despairing of the interposition 
of their government, in their behalf; inasmuch as the terms 
of Algerine captivity served to enforce their anti-commercial 
policy ; had raised a fund to purchase the liberty of those 
captives ; and that in order to take the best possible chance 
of success, by treating him with the respect of having the 
negotiation proposed to him through a government organ 
rather than through mere individuals, the regency had con- 
sented, through benevolence and humanity, to allow it to 
be conducted in their name. The minister, to whom this 
communication was made, promised to give us an answer 
the following morning. 

" At the promised time, the answer of the dey was deli- 
vered to the Spanish consul and myself, and consisted in 
this, to wit : ' Tell the consul and the agent of his govern- 
ment and of the American merchants in Cadiz, that my 
policy and my views are^ to increase^ not to diminish^ the 
number of my American slaves ; and that not for a million 
of do liars xvould I releas e them? 

" When leaving Gibraltar for Algiers, Mr. Cardoio, 
there styled king of the Jews, from the high rank, conse- 
quence, and respectability which have been so justly ac- 
corded to him by the general sentiment, gave me very spe- 
cial letters of recommendation to the wealthy and powerful 
Jews, the Bacris, in the place of my destination. To Jacob 
Bacri I particularly addressed myself, and found him every 
way polite and accommodating. He, without hesitation, 
told me that the dey was not only ready, but indeed anx- 
ious to conclude a treaty with the United States ; and that, 
as auxiliary to his negotiations, in that respect, he set the 
•highest value upon the Americans, then in his power. I 



as 

ij^ressed him to indicate to me the terms which the dey ex- 
pected to obtain in the event of a treaty. He then informed 
me, that it was a settled point with the dey, from which he 
would by no means swerve, that, in the first place, for the 
privilege of passing the Straits, or as is commonly said, the 
Gut, of Gibraltar, two millions of dollars would be required 
of the American government. That then the stipulations of 
the late treaty might be renewed ; the United States paying 
up beforehand all the arrearages accruing under that treaty, 
not only to the time of colonel Lear's dismission, but also 
such as could be estimated to accrue throughout the interval 
from that dismission to the period of renewal. From the 
ample evidence, that I was in possession of, establishing and 
tendering indubitable the close, intimate, and confidential 
connection which subsisted between the Bacris and the 
Algerine cabinet, I considered the information just de- 
tailed — especially, when there existed no motive on the part 
of my informant to practise deception, but, on the contrary, 
the powerful one of vanity, to prompt him to a display of the 
high consideration he held, in relation to that cabinet, by 
being let into the secret of their views — as correct, and as 
much worthy of being relied upon as if it had reached me 
directly from the dey himself. Upon my suggesting, with 
the most studied indifference, that these requisitions would 
be more onerous to the United States than any that were 
exacted from or submitted to by any other Christian 
power, he readily agreed that the fact was so. But, said 
he, the United States are considered by this government, to 
be rich, and always disposed to adopt that alternative 
which is the least costly. Their captive citizens here they 
must release : and, above alU they must establish a security 
against future captivity, and the spoliation of their com- 
merce in the Mediterranean and the neighbouring seas. 
Now the treaty which is indispensable to secure to them 
these important objects must either be purchased or ex- 
torted by means of a naval armament. The question, then, 
arises, under the known policy of the American govern- 
ment : which of these two expedients, purchase, or naval 



39 

equipments, will cost the least money, or be of the cheapest 
attainment ? Their navy, only about equal now to that of 
the dey, will undoubtedly be annihilated by the English in 
the present war ; so that being without any naval force at 
all on the return of peace with England— on which return 
only could an attack be made by them on Algiers— they 
would have to incur expenses, in preparing an adequate force 
to make that attack, to an amount much greater than that of 
the dey's requisitions. Consequently, then, as he makes 
those requisitions the cheaper alternative, he conceives that 
there will be no difficulty in their being submitted to. 

" The great importance attached to the strength and re- 
sources of the Algerines, and the impregnable character as- 
signed to their capital, seem to have been conjectured 
through a bare superficial review of the immense and for- 
midable expeditions, that have, at different periods, been 
fitted out against that capital, from Spain, and their disas- 
trous terminations ; without a thorough examination of the 
special circumstances by whose agency and influence those 
calamitous results were produced. 

" Charles V. of Germany, and I. of Spain, after van- 
quishing, in Tunis, Hyradin Barbarossa— at once vice-roy 
of that place and king of Algiers— was, on invading Al- 
giers, compelled to abandon his enterprise, and to fly, with 
the remains of his late victorious and numerous forces, be- 
fore the lieutenant of Barbarossa, commanding only a mise- 
rable band of barbarians, not amounting to more than a 
tenth part of the force over which the invaders had just 
before triumphed. But although, on this occasion, the most 
powerful monarch and consummate warrior of Christen- 
dom, at the head of an immense army of veterans, is seen 
to have been fully discomfited and foiled ; yet not to the 
strength or resources of Algiers was his defeat attributable, 
but to one of those calamities of nature which no human 
foresight could discern, and against which no human efforts 
could be of any avail. An overwhelming tempest, not the 
eunuch Hassan with his five thousand Moors and eight hun» 
dred Turks, broke into fragments the troops of the emperor, 



40 

"In 1775, Charles III. fitted out an immense expedition 
for the reduction of Algiers. Fifty-one ships of war, six 
of which were of the line, all completely equipped, and 
twenty-six thousand men, exclusive of marines and sailors, 
constituted the formidable force for the accomplishment of 
the undertaking. But so miserably conducted was this enter-^ 
prise, both in respect to the place and manner of attack, that 
to ascribe the consequent disasters, exclusively, to ignorance 
and stupidity, would be to depreciate and treat with too little 
respect the virtues of loyalty and fidelity, by protecting, from 
merited censure and animadversion, the correspondent vices 
of treachery and corruption. Instead of attacking Achilles 
in the heel^ the assailing force was thrown away upon his 
shield. The Spanish generalissimo, instead of attacking 
vigorously the works upon the mole—the vulnerable and, 
indeed, vital part of his enemy — employed his efforts on 
some of the out-batteries only, in a distant direction, three 
or four miles from the town and from the only point on 
which a sensible, much more a mortal, impression was to 
be made. And not only did he fail thus, as to the place^ 
but likewise as to the man^ier^ of his attack, which was 
equally unmilitary and ineffectual: because, 1st. the most 
protracted delay took place, as to the disembarkation of the 
troops, whereby the enemy were allowed abundant time for 
assembling their forces: 2d. the lengthened eminence par- 
allel to the beach and commanding it, was not attempted to 
be gained, in a single point, by the invaders, but was left 
wholly and quietly to the occupancy of the Algerines : and 
3d. the first division, consisting of grenadiers and light in- 
fantry, xv'ithout a single piece of artillery to protect and sup- 
port them^ advanced upon the enemy strongly and advan-i 
tageously posted, and thereby caused themselves to be 
thrown into confusion, and forced back into a precipitate 
retreat, just in time to meet, in a disordered state, the se- 
cond division, consisting of the artillery, in the moment of 
their disembarkation ; so that the first division communi- 
cating to the second the panic with which it was seized 
itself, the whole were involved in tumult and overthrow. 



41 

Thus disastrously and Ingloriously terminated this pompous 
and formidable expedition ; whilst an inconsiderable por- 
tion of the force of which it was composed, if judiciously 
and prudently managed, would have been amply adequate 
to the attainment of the object for which it was set on foot. 

" Towards the close of the same reign, in 1783, another 
expedition was sent out against Algiers, which, though not 
disastrous in like manner as the other, was, nevertheless, 
unproductive of any substantial injury to the invaded. A 
distant, intermittent bombardment— ^oW more than iron 
having been employed in it — in which some buildings were 
injured, constituted the sum and measure of the last exer- 
tions of the cross against the crescent. 

" By her marine only is Algiers a formidable or injurious 
power. Into whatsoever colossal strength or size her 
military resources might be presumed to swell, a distant 
commercial nation, like the United States, accessible and 
vulnerable only upon the seas, could never, in the least, be 
affected thereby. And however iniquitous and diabolical 
soever might be the maxims of Algerine policy, yet, as, 
without a marine, those maxims could never be reduced to 
practice— at least against the United States— their existence 
in the abstract only would be perfectly harmless and inof- 
fensive. Her marine^ then, is the sting through which Al- 
giers infuses her poison into Americans— a poison now bur- 
rowing itself into the American flesh, and mingling its cor- 
rosive lymph with the marrow of the American bone ! Let 
Americans, then, take warning and learn wisdom from 
those who have gone before them against Algiers ; and to 
their naval skill and prowess, the drawing of the Algerine 
sting would be a task as easy and certain in its performance 
as, in its consequences, it would be glorious and advan- 
tageous. 

" The true point, and only true point, of attack, on Al- 
giers, is the mole. The works upon the mole, it is certain, 
exhibit, upon a superficial view, a tremendous aspect. The 
fortifications admit ot the mounting of upwards of five 
hundred pieces of cannon— although that number is not 

F 



42 

always mounted — and would seem to hurl a proud defiance 
even in the very teeth of the collected squadrons of Great Bri- 
tain. This menacing monster, however, is, in reality, a mere 
mock-gorgon. But if indeed it were a real one, still the 
lofty and intrepid souls of a Rogers, a Decatur, a Hull, a 
Bainbridge, a Jones, a Porter, and of their heroic comrades, 
animated by a love of glory, and of their country's rights, 
would not only disdain to shrink back from it, but, on the 
contrary, would proudly rush upon it, whenever a compe- 
tent prospect of success would justify the assault. This 
assault every prospect of success would justify. The Al- 
gerines have not a single artillerist or engineer, who de- 
serves to be called such, among them.* Their cannon are 
all of brass, which, as soon as heated, are known to rebound 
with violence : the carriages, weak and imperfect in the ex- 
treme in their original construction, are, as respects a vast 
proportion of them, decayed and ruined; so that, after a 
short discharge, the guns would, of themselves, become dis- 
mounted. The embrasures are so constructed as not to ad- 
mit of scarce the least possible variation in the horizontal 
direction of the pieces, whilst the carriages are totally un- 
fixed for either elevation or depression. The rammers, 
sponges, and matches, are of a piece with the carriages. 
There are no furnaces for heating shot. Throughout some 
of the curtains of the fortifications there are three tiers of 
guns, and never less than two : but, after the first round or 
two, the lower tiers would, if fired at all, have to be fired 
at random, on account of the obscurity that would be pro- 
duced by the smokef in the close and confined cells within 

* Several French officers, after the date of the foregoing' letter, entered 
into the service of the dey, and greatly strengthened and improved the 
works upon the mole, before lord Exmouth's attack upon it ; an attack, 
which, although the same officers assisted in repelling it, might have even- 
tuated in the utter and permanent ruin of tlie place, instead of its par- 
tial dilapidation, had such ruin been the object of the assailants. 

■j- This smoke might be rendered very embai'assing to the enemy, if ad- 
vantage could be taken of the wind, so as to have it from the ships to the 
fortifications. Sehtoritjs routed, in Lusitania, the Chai'acitani, by the 
windward management of the dust. 



43 

which those tiers are ranged. Thus much for the nume- 
rous inherent causes of embarrassment and ineffectiveness 
in the works of the enemy, and the enemy themselves. Let 
us now superadd to them the dismaying and overwhelming 
embarrassments proceeding from the assailants. 

" Tivo seveiUy-fours^ four frigates ^ and twelve gun-boats^ 
would constitute the maximum of the force requisite for the 
contemplated purpose. These vessels should be anchored at 
half-pistol-shot from the fortifications upon the mole ; choos- 
ing their positions to the northward and westward of the 
same, so as to be covered from the fort on the margin of 
the bay, that commands the entrance of the harbour and 
ranges in a south-easterly direction, from the mole, with fort 
Emperor, which stands on a conspicuous eminence, too dis- 
tant to do any injury. The water is sufficient for this an- 
chorage. The boldness of the attack from these floating- 
batteries would, in the first place, like an electric shock, ap- 
pal and confound the rabble garrison, whilst the fragments 
of the upper-works flying in every direction, the obscurity in 
the under-works, the dismounted guns in every tier, and the 
carnage produced by the shot, would, with their blended ter- 
rors, put that garrison to a speedy flight and place the whole 
extent of the mole in the possession and at the mercy of 
the assailants, who, thus possessed of and commanding these 
works, would thereby be complete masters of the city. Before 
takingpossession of themole, by means of rockets, every ves- 
sel in the harbour could, if necessary, be easily destroyed. 
The Algerine squadron is composed of four frigates, four cor- 
vettes, three sloops of war, one Greek prize-ship equipped 
during my stay in Algiers, and some paltry force in gun-boats. 
Not one of these vessels would dare to leave the harbour, to 
expose themselves in the bay: and, in the harbour, not a 
single gun could any of them fire, with the least effect. If the 
garrison themselves, before flying into the town, should not 
set fire to their shipping, it would, perhaps, be well for the 
American commander to make it, in the most effectual man- 
ner possible, subservient to the destruction of the harbour ; 
which, from being very small, so small as scarce to admit 



44 

of a single vessel additional to the little squadron I have 
mentioned to lie within it, might be easily choaked up. 
Previously to accepting any terms of negotiation, the har- 
bour should be completely destroyed, and the whole range 
of fortifications upon the mole should be reduced to a pile of 
ruins— thus to stand a perpetual monument of American 
skill and prowess^ and a perpetual security for American eX' 
emption from Algerine depredation .' Peace would then fol- 
low on whatever terms the American commissioner might 
dictate — even to his receiving a contribution equivalent to 
the expenses of the expedition. 

" Should any addition, to the maximum of the force speci- 
fied, be deemed necessary, it might be made to consist of 
three or four bomb-ketches for throwing shells into the town 
during the attack upon the mole. Algiers is peculiarly sus- 
ceptible of injury from a given bomb force. The city, rising in 
regular gradation from the sea, upon the acclivity of a hill, 
enables the engineer to take into one complete and distinct 
view its every section ; so that he may select for the object 
of his aim, whatever precise part he may deem fit. Scarce 
a foot of waste ground is to be found, on which a shell could 
be lost: for the streets, so far from furnishing such ground, 
are almost entirely covered by the arches of the contiguous 
projections of the opposite buildings ; so that, by means of 
such projections, one shell would be capable of rending and 
breaking down the street-walls of two houses at the same 
time. 

" To pacificate with the Algerines without fighting them 
would unavoidably involve, not only an immense sacrifice 
of money, but, also, a loss to the American navy of a most 
favourable opportunity of reaping a rich harvest of glory.'* 

My letter, from which the preceding extracts are taken, 
after having been transmitted to your excellency, as already 
mentioned, was, by you, as secretary of state, under 
president Madison, sent, with your report thereon, of the 
20th of February, 1815 — a report in which you acknowledg- 
ed that " every effort"*^ had been made by me to effect the ran- 



45 

som referred to— to congress,* and served as the ground- work 
of the operations, on the part of the United States, against 
Algiers ; operations, which, with the utmost economy, pro- 
duced the most happy results for this country, both in respect 
oi fame and interest. 

Upon the occurrence of a pecuniary misunderstanding 
between your excellency and your consul— a misunder- 
standing settled afterwards in his favour by a special act of 
congress, candidly approved by yourself, on further reflec- 
tion — a call was made by you on your attorney-general, now 
your minister in London, for his opinion, in relation there- 
to. And this gentleman, mistaking, as it would seem, your 
wish to be the discrediting your own secret instructions to 
your consul about the ransom in Algiers, by means of his^ 
the attorney-general's, interpretation of them ; and also, in 
the same mistaken sense, supposing that, by such an inter' 
pretation of a text as clear as day-light^ he might multiply 
the chances of his drawing, in an office-lottery, the prize of 
a diplomatic occasion for veiling political animosity with the 
gauze of ore-rotundo declamation, at city feasts ; actually 
and in good-earnest set himself to work to illuminate the day' 
light of that text with the claro-obscuro glimmer of a rush- 
light commentary.] 

*The National Intelligencer, a government gazette, of the 7th of March, 
1815, referring to my Algerine communication — after having been allowed 
a view of it and of the proceei^ngs thereon, by the committee, whose 
chairman was Mr. Gaston, of the House of Representatives — stated that 
the evidence it contained was " conclusive of the impossibility of re-esta- 
blishmg peace with the dey, unless by coercion or the most base and humili- 
ating conditions." 

■J- Under the guidance of oracular inspiration, the attorney-general, ad- 
verting to his text, says — " I am of opinion that the power given to 
Mr. Noah might have justified the employment of an agent, but that it 
does not j ustify such an agent as he employed in the manner stated.* ' The 
attorney-general was too prudent to assign any reason for his sweeping de- 
signation of " such an agent." 

Now, I, this " such an agent," duly appointed by him who had unlimit- 
ed power from your excellency to appoint any one that suited him, not on- 
ly made " every effort," as acknowledged by yourself, for the attainmeni 
of your only desideratum of ransom — beyond which I was neither paid 
nw bound to go— but, also, at the risk of my life, and at my own cost, with 



46 

My agency, then, in Algiers, although beneficial ?cci6. cheap 
—cheap to the United States but costly to me* — brought 
down upon me the expression of your ire. But I verily be?-' 
lieve that this expression of your ire was made under invo- 
luntarily mistaken impressions: for I cannot conceive how 
it was possible that for a mere abstract difference in politics 
you should have attempted, as you did, to affix to my name 
the stigma of " a most obnoxious character.'''' But calumny it 
was — for my defamer confesses to have corresponded with 
you from Cadiz against me — that, with its multiform guises, 
surprised your credulity and even conciliated your frank- 
ness into its ally against me ! Your sight was unceasingly 
assailed with the exhibition of my caricature under every 
variegated form ; and knowing not the original you took up 
the natural bias of deluded vision. Apart from embargo- 
breaker ^nd politico 'invective-maker — characters, in the end, 
too general to become censurable — I was represented to you 
in the odious colours of an ungrateful seducer^ a New-Tork 
" rapto^'' -perpetrator^ a Baltimore-horror-iser^ a Louisiana- 
refuge'Seeker^ a Mexican conspirator.^ a United States-tri- 
pie-traitor^ viz : a Burr traitor^ a Spanish-manuscript-trai- 
tor ^ and — hapless Packenham, that, by me, thou wouldst 
be counselled or even led ! — a New-Orleans-Anglo-battle- 
plan-traitor /f 

out reimbui'sement, acquiied important and abundant data for enabling 
the government of the United States to shape aright their course of Bar- 
barypoUcy, in opposition to the gigantic influence of the bxiy hig- off conn- 
cils of the late consul-general of Algiers, and for giving to the world a 
fresh proof of the salutary effect of the good old revolutionary maxim: 
millions for defence but not a barley-corn for tribute. 

* Had I, instead of going to Algiers, gone directly to Mexico, to take 
possession there of the immense grant that the cortes made to me a few 
days (.\ovember 29, 181 ;) before my depai-ture for the former place, by 
way of 1 angler, I should have avoided the calamitous results of that calum- 
ny, which, like an overwhelming torrent, rushed upon me, after the re-es- 
tablishment of Spanish despotism. I must, also, here add an extract of a 
letter addressed to me by a distinguished friend of the :/resent administra- 
tion on this subject. It runs thus : " / tuould not have undertaken what 
ymi did fo" a million of dollars, and your advice how the war was to be carri- 
ed on with Algiers, saved us that amount." 

t If I had, indeed, been the planner of the attack on New-Orleans— -as 



Having now gone through the review of which I spoke 
in the beginning of this letter — a review, in which, I can- 
not but flatter myself, you have seen enough of proof and ar- 
gument to convince you of the gross impostures that have 
been practised upon yourself and against me— it i-emains 
only for me, at present, to assure you of the respect with 
which I am, 

Your excellency's 

Obedient servant, 

RICHARD RAYNAL KEENE. 

Mansion- House ^ Philadelphia^ Dec. 25th, 1824. 

i/ott have understood to be the case-— not your excellency, but George IVo 
should have shed his malediction upon me : for a more unmilitary plan of 
operations was, perhaps, never heard of. But who is the man that will, 
otherwise than inquisitorialli/, upon the strength of fabncated manuscripts, 

dare to pronounce my agency in that battle or its plan to be a fact ? 

If no testimony be given of it, let it, with its kindred calumnies, be burled 
mthe same grave already dug for them, by the depositions of Messrs. 
Martin and Harper, without longer offending American sight and smell 
with its putrid remains. 



I £ Jr. '12 



